


we'll cast some light and you'll be alright

by arachnistar



Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: 5x20, Angst, F/M, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-09
Updated: 2018-05-09
Packaged: 2019-05-04 05:19:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14585814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arachnistar/pseuds/arachnistar
Summary: “Where’s Jake?”“He left to help Rosa.”Amy takes a break from fixing the toilet. [Canon divergent fic for 5x20 Show Me Going]





	we'll cast some light and you'll be alright

**Author's Note:**

> Whipped this up after Show Me Going which left me with a lot of emotions. I’m still not over the hugs. Or Jake talking about emotions. Or Amy in general. Anyway, title is from Crosses by Jose Gonzalez and a few of the lines in this fic are from the episode. 
> 
> Also **warning** for an anxiety attack.

 

Amy’s eyes sweep across the bullpen. There’s Hitchcock and Scully drinking sodas and Terry with a blood pressure cuff around his arm and Charles, forlorn at his desk, checking his phone incessantly. She can see Captain Holt in his office, sitting motionless instead of working, hints of sadness in the downturn of his mouth and the wrinkles around his eyes. But Jake’s seat is empty. Which doesn’t have to mean anything, she tells herself even as her stomach clenches.  

She walks over to Charles and clears her throat. He doesn’t look up. She nudges him and when he looks up, she asks. “Where’s Jake?” 

Charles is silent. His lip curls in and his eyes drift down to the floor and her chest tightens because she knows that look and she knows Jake and oh God. He wouldn’t have –   

And even though she knows the answer, knows he absolutely would, she asks again, “Where is he?” 

Charles swallows. “He left to help Rosa.”

Amy’s knees start to shake and she was barely holding it together knowing that Rosa was in danger and now with Jake out there too... Her eyes sting, making the world blur around the edges, and then there’s an arm around her – Charles, some distant part of her mind notes – and he’s helping her down into a chair as her legs give out. 

She can’t do this, she can’t have her two best friends in danger while she’s stuck here, failing to fix a goddamn toilet because there’s nothing else she can do. Her eyes shut. Maybe she can – but Captain Holt ordered them to stay here – there’s a whole squadron of officers at the scene – except Jake went – Jake left because Rosa is in danger and he’ll be in danger too and she doesn’t know what she’ll do if one of them gets hurt – or dies, there’s every chance that one of them may die – there’s already been multiple casualties – or both, what if they both die, what if they both get shot and bleed out all alone – and she’s stuck here, incapable of doing a simple repair, let alone anything meaningful –  

“Amy, breathe.” Charles’ voice cuts through the storm of thoughts and she sucks in a sharp breath. And then several more, too fast and shallow to really count. She wishes she was somewhere else, somewhere more private she could break down, not in the middle of the bullpen in sight of Captain Holt’s office, but she isn’t sure her legs could take her anywhere at this point. “Follow my count. One, two, three, four, in.”

She focuses on Charles’ words, on counting along with him, on each exhale and inhale, anything but the thoughts churning in her head, and soon she’s breathing to the rhythm he’s set. Her mind begins to settle and she carefully lays out the facts as if this was any other facet of her life.

1) Rosa is at the Brooklyn Heights shooting, 2) Jake took off to help her, 3) ESU and the 97 are there with plenty of competent officers, and 4) there is nothing she can do to help and nothing to gain from her taking off after them. 

That last fact slams into her, leaves her feeling small and decidedly not like the badass police sergeant who took down a man with just a bridal sash a couple weeks ago. 

Her shoulders fold in, but before she can start crying, she thinks about the rest of her friends gathered around her and about Gina waiting in the bathroom. Gina listening to music to calm her anxiety, Gina hiding her fears behind her quips, Gina who doesn’t know that her childhood friend has gone after Rosa, risking his life in the process.

Amy can be strong for them. She can go back to the bathroom and focus on her work until Rosa and Jake return. She can do that much.

(It’s all she can do.)

“I’m sorry, Amy.” 

Amy looks at Charles. He looks so apologetic, his eyes round with concern, that she can’t be mad at him regardless of his role in helping Jake get away with this. She sighs. “You couldn’t have stopped him.”

“He’ll come back.” Charles says with a forced confidence that just barely masks the quiver in his voice. “It’s Jake. Jake and Rosa, together they’re tough enough that no one’s going to stand in their way.”

Melanie Hawkins comes to mind, an immovable object the two of them weren’t able to conquer on their own. Amy doesn’t say anything. She just agrees with Charles and checks her phone and tries to pretend that it doesn’t hurt when she sees there are no missed calls or texts waiting for her.    

“Hey everyone.” Amy’s head whips up as Jake arrives with two pizza boxes and a stack of paper plates in hand. “I got pizza.”

Amy jumps to her feet. He freezes, returns her gaze with one mixed with apology and regret, lips pulled thin, as if he knows exactly what’s been running through her head.

“Jake.” Her voice cracks and then he’s setting the pizza boxes down on Scully’s desk and striding towards her. She’s not aware of moving but then her arms wrap around him and she crushes herself against him, burying her head into him, nosing his hoodie out of the way so she can get closer to his warmth. She breathes in. He smells like sweat, and the bad body spray he sometimes uses when he goes undercover, and home.

“I’m sorry, Ames.” He whispers, just loud enough that only she can hear. “I’m sorry.”

Her fingers curl into the leather of his jacket and a small, irrational part of her never wants to let him go, as if that can somehow shield him from the world’s dangers. She breathes out, the words muffled against him. “You came back.” 

“Peralta?” Amy draws away from Jake at Captain Holt’s approach, some air of professionalism reasserting itself, though she stays close enough that she can still feel his body heat emanating from him. Her hand travels down his arm to take his. “Why are you back so soon?”

Jake glances at her, then at the others, and back at Holt, his eyes serious. “Because I wanted to do something.”

Holt stares at him a moment and then nods, some silent communication passed between them. Amy files the shared look away to ask Jake about later.

Jake squeezes her hand once and then pulls away to hand out pizza. Amy shakes her head at his offer, her stomach’s still in knots, she couldn’t get anything down if she tried right now, and he hands it to Charles. “How’re you holding up?”

And as Jake starts to talk to Charles, tells him that they should talk about their feelings instead of compartmentalizing this situation, her chest glows warm with pride and affection for the man he’s become. A small smile spreads across her face watching him. She stays for just a moment to take this in, but there’s a toilet that she needs to return to and, perhaps more importantly, Gina who needs someone just as much as the rest of them.

No one’s paying much attention to her, so it’s easy for Amy to slip away. She’s halfway to the women’s bathroom when Jake’s voice stops her. “Hey.” 

“Hey.” Amy turns and he’s right there, his arms going up around her. She steps into the embrace, grips his jacket and sets enough distance between them that she can still see his face. He’s chewing on his lip and his eyes watch her carefully.

“I’m sorry.”

She sighs. “I know.” 

“I wanted to help Rosa.” 

“I know. I want to help her too.”

Jake bobs his head. “I thought I could do something, rush in and save the day like John McClane, but… I can’t do anything.”

She can’t blame him for his impulse, when she so very much wants to do the same. It’s an appealing fantasy, but it’s just that, a fantasy. There are no gun-blazing heroics in real life.

“None of us can.” She agrees, strokes her thumb in a small circle. “You came back though.”

He nods. “I came back. I can’t help her right now, but I can help here.”

She nods, chews on her lip as she debates telling him what’s been going through her head. He knows, but sometimes it helps to speak the words.

“I’m scared for Rosa. I couldn’t take being scared for you too.” And then, quieter, shaking, “I can’t lose you. I can’t.”  

His lips press against her forehead. They’re both quiet and Amy knows he’s thinking the same thing, that there’s always a chance that one of them may die and leave the other alone. Life is unpredictable like that.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Amy pauses. It’s something they need to talk about - not here and not now, but later, once Rosa comes back safe ( _if_ she comes back safe, but Amy doesn’t want to imagine that other grimmer reality) and they’re home in their shared apartment, curled up close. “Later.”

She pushes herself up on her tiptoes, using his hoodie to pull him closer as his hands travel up her back, and kisses him. The kiss is brief and chaste, lips gliding soundlessly against one another, a small comfort and a promise. Later. After, Amy drops back on her feet. His hands drift down to her hips and his gaze centers on her.

“Rosa will come back too.” 

Amy nods. There’s just the slightest tremble in her shoulders to betray her uncertainty. “I should finish fixing the toilet before she gets back.”

“I’m sure you’ll win in the end.” His gaze lingers on her wet shirt and she scoffs at him, cheeks flushing with the spirit of competition and the need to do this one thing for Rosa. She might not be able to have her back in the field right now, but she can make sure Rosa has a bathroom to return to.

“You better believe that toilet is going down.”  

He smiles then. It’s small and fragile, delicate like so many things. “Go get ‘em.”

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to chat with me about peraltiago/b99/anything else, you can find me on [Tumblr](http://proofthatihaveaheart.tumblr.com/).


End file.
